Tag Archives: land

As I walk

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And finally, I find myself
enjoying the companionship of silence,
of having no instructions
as my feet step out in front of me,
of spinning no stories  –
just letting the things I see be hymns –
the deer with their tentative presence,
the grass now green again, ferns gone brown,
the piercing blue as fog lifts,
the bracing cold

There’s memory, too –
images unfolding, innocent of judgment,
showing I can also
see my folly without regret,
and younger viewpoints
without correcting

So I learn kindness
in the stillness deep inside,
so I learn quiet
in the unassuming rhythm of the land.

©Wendy Mulhern
December 1, 2020

Nonetheless

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It could be a small thing.
It wouldn’t have to be something like
the raising of a barn
or a transformation in consciousness

It could be the view across a field
just in one moment,
or the huddle space
where the fire is warm
while the cold air
creeps around my back

It could be a small thing I notice
that shows, nonetheless,
the sweetness of our lives.

©Wendy Mulhern
November 29, 2020

Working in November

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That we can work together
through rain,
that we can be cheerful
as puddles form
and gloves get wet
gives me a chortle,
a bright warming,
an inner heat source
to counteract my dampened clothes

We kept on working
while the rain came harder,
and then it stopped, and we continued,
the appreciation that we had
each for the other
as strong a structure as the frame we built.

©Wendy Mulhern
November 3, 2020

A Gift

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It may be a great gift
not to have the choice
whether to notice
the specificity of days –
the arc the moon takes through the night,
the temperature, whether the fog will lift,
or if it settles to a soft drizzle,
slowly saturating gloves and cuffs

In many striking moments
we look up from our work
and call out to each other – look –
the way the light is sitting on the field now,
the way the moon peaks through –
It is a gift,
though we may wish it otherwise –
it makes us richer,
despite how we may feel.

©Wendy Mulhern
October 30, 2020

Framing the Barn

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It was a good day’s work,
however many times I had to recut the boards –
Recut, remeasure, try to find the place
where my precision slipped. Eventually,
I got them all done. Well, all but one,
which was persistently too short

It was a good day’s work
because I could contribute –
things I could do helped us get through
to the almost where we hoped for
place we ended up

We were a team, and we will be
an even better team tomorrow.
That, as much as structure,
is what we build each day.

©Wendy Mulhern
October 9, 2020

Best Served

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The dream of finished work
is dangerous. I start imagining
how it would feel
to wash my dishes in a sink,
to take a bath,
to walk on clean smooth floors
with bare feet, to see the brightness
and the color in the walls

Better to step back and be glad
that on a rare cool summer day
I already can bake,
and light a fire,
and watch the mist
from a dry place inside

Everything will come in time,
and I’m best served
by living in the glory of today,
by giving what is asked of me
and counting that for joy.

©Wendy Mulhern
August 6, 2020

Partnership

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The land starts to tell me of our partnership
in phrases I can understand –
scent of sweet grass, and blackberry,
carried on the wind,
fledgling birds – jays, swallows, towhees,
calls of doves and hawks and deer

It hints of sensing our potential,
and patience till we come into our own.-
that we will tend it, and that it will flourish,
with more and more life
flowing in our home

Not a relationship of need
so much as dance – that we will each
bring out the richness of each other –
We will thrive, and it will thrive right with us,
all attesting to the potency of love.

©Wendy Mulhern
July 24, 2020

Chores on the Land

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We spent three days
thwarting the plans of tansy,
pulling it by the roots,
cutting its yellow heads,
filling the plastic bags

There was time in the work for thinking –
how you spend so much of your life
trying to prove
to yourself and to others
that you are worthy,

And when you discover
your worthiness never was doubted,
always was secure,
there’s still a sweet desire
to be of service,
to lend your gifts
to the great unfolding
of every day.

©Wendy Mulhern
July 22, 2020

Easy Enough

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It’s easy enough
in the sun and the wind
and the all too rare
time of conversation
to have my head filled up with nothing
as I dump grass seeds out of my boots
and pick them out of my socks

Its easy enough
to let the rhythm of the day
and the chirps and dramas of turkeys
and the quiet fact of friendship
have the last word.

©Wendy Mulhern
July 17, 2020

Sharing

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I haven’t yet lived in a house
that birds want to fly into –
this one, being unfinished,
seems to offer enticements,
all these rafters, all these open spaces,
and the wind that makes itself at home here

These structures we make for ourselves
are not unnoticed by others –
they move in, they make a place for themselves,
as has always been intended
through all the time of living –
we make room for each other,
we share the land.